Science & Technology News

[Eigenvector]

For what it's worth...........


https://www.newsweek.com/fact-check-...rbines-1569762

[newhaul]

Originally Posted by SailOar

And we are waiting for you to provide a reference to your assertion that petroleum-based de-icers are used on wind turbine blades. I'm guessing you just pulled that factoid out of your keister, like a number of your statements appear to have been.

I stand corrected it is a propylene glycol and salts mix not polypropylene glycol.

Heated in a tank truck and deployed hot from a helicopter or drone spraying it on the blades .

[GordMay]

Originally Posted by newhaul

I stand corrected it is a propylene glycol and salts mix not polypropylene glycol.
Heated in a tank truck and deployed hot from a helicopter or drone spraying it on the blades .

It appears (to me) you still stand un-corrected.
What is your source, for the notion that (any) glycol solution is typically used to de-ice wind turbine blades, in Texas (or elsewhere)?

[newhaul]

Originally Posted by GordMay

It appears (to me) you still stand un-corrected.
What is your source, for the notion that (any) glycol solution is typically used to de-ice wind turbine blades, in Texas (or elsewhere)?

Asked family that are in the business and they are reliable . And that's good enough for me.
Similar to what is used to deice aircraft.

[Lake-Effect]

Originally Posted by Eigenvector

For what it's worth...........
https://www.newsweek.com/fact-check-...rbines-1569762

Thanks. It's just nuts that anyone would seize on the occasional need to de-ice the blades as some sort of death-blow against wind generation. You could make the blades from stiffened narwhals and de-ice them weekly, and they're still more planet-friendly than fossil fuel.

Of course its just nuts that there are people against any sort of renewables period.

[GordMay]

Originally Posted by newhaul

Asked family that are in the business and they are reliable . And that's good enough for me.
Similar to what is used to deice aircraft.

FWIW:

Chloride salts are prohibited for use on aircraft, because they can be corrosive. So like automobile antifreeze, aircraft deicing fluids are aqueous solutions of a glycol, or mixture of glycols, along with proprietary additives. Depending on the formulation required, the additives might include a surfactant, polymer thickening agent, pH buffer, corrosion inhibitor, flame retardant, or dye.

According to Transport Canada, “Deicing fluids are typically ethylene glycol, diethylene glycol or propylene glycol based fluids containing water, corrosion inhibitors, wetting agents and dye.
Anti-icing fluids are similar in composition except that they also contain polymeric thickeners. They are formulated to prevent formation of unabsorbed frozen contamination for a longer period of time than deicing fluids; however, the protection is still for a limited period of time.”
➥ https://tc.canada.ca/en/aviation/pub...cing-fluids-15

Also, FWIW: Wind turbine blades are not aircraft.

Reminds me of that unimpeachable source, the un-named source, of unknown authority ...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eN4I3XIoRxA

[Dockhead]

Originally Posted by Lake-Effect

Thanks. It's just nuts that anyone would seize on the occasional need to de-ice the blades as some sort of death-blow against wind generation. You could make the blades from stiffened narwhals and de-ice them weekly, and they're still more planet-friendly than fossil fuel.

Of course its just nuts that there are people against any sort of renewables period.

I agree entirely. It's silliness. I remember how the Greens used to complain about the "horrendous" amount of carbon emitted for all the concrete used to build a nuclear plant. People too dense to calculate what that amounts to, amortized over the life of the plant, and how it's a millionth (or less) as much per GWh as the carbon emitted by a fossil fuel plant, per GWh.


Same here -- it's just inflammatory, intended to evoke irrational feelings. If anyone seriously thinks that using a bit of glycol and a bit of jet fuel on the odd ice storm day makes even a measurable difference in the carbon per GWh produced with wind power -- just do the math.


Yes, the blades are GRP made with petroleum. Yes, the concrete foundations require emission of carbon to build. Yes, diesel fuel is burned copiously in the process of bringing the equipment and building it up. But amortize that over the life of the turbine -- it's hardly measurable compared to power produced by actually BURNING the stuff day in and day out.

[Mike OReilly]

With regard to heated windmill blades, I'd never heard of such a thing despite having some familiarity with cold-weather windmills. So I went searching...

I found numerous references to the various approaches being tried, or in use. ONE of them involves using heated air. The others include the use of electrical wire heating, or coatings or special materials on the blades. Then there's the control techniques to quickly alter speed to shake ice free.

My research did not turn up any direct explanation as to how the air is heated in the air-heated option. It could be fossil fuel, or it could be electrical.

Just a couple of references:

https://www.windpowerengineering.com...urbine-blades/

https://www.reutersevents.com/renewa...turbine-blades

[Dockhead]

Originally Posted by GordMay

Running a car costs much more than people think — stalling the uptake of green travel
Car owners underestimate total vehicle costs. Giving consumers this information could encourage the switch to cleaner transport and reduce emissions.

“... Consumers decide whether to own a vehicle on the basis of considerations such as where they live and the vehicle’s upfront and lifetime costs12. If they systematically underestimate total costs, this could increase car ownership and its associated emissions. It could also make alternative forms of transport — car sharing, alternative-fuel vehicles, public transport, biking or walking, say — seem less attractive ...
... We find that people underestimate the total cost of owning a car by about 50% ...”

More ➥ https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-020-01118-w

Supplementary information ➥ https://media.nature.com/original/ma...118-w/17904042

I have been living without a car (strange way to live for someone who grew up in the U.S.) for the last 5 years or so. Instead of own car, I get around by: (a) Uber (or taxi); (b) bicycle; (c) on foot; (d) trams and metro; (e) electric scooters rented by the minute; (f) car sharing; (g) rental cars. And (h) shopping online with delivery replacing 90% of going to shops.

I can say that it is dramatically cheaper, even using Uber pretty intensively. It saves a lot of hassle, especially -- parking. It does change the way you live -- no jumping in the car to spontaneously pick something up; dramatically narrows the geographic range of daily life. But not all the change is negative -- more bicycle and walking is healthy and pleasant. Maybe you don't range as far, but you see the area you live in much more closely than you do from the window of a car.


Shopping online saves a dramatic amount of time. No driving, parking, standing in line, shlepping. Whatever it is you need just appears.


No question owning a car is costly and a lot of trouble, especially if you buy new or newish cars and change them often, rather than driving old cars for a long time.

I am just waiting for self-driving, public cars -- that will be a real revolution.

[Mike OReilly]

I still own a car; a 2008 Honda Fit. We mostly use it to traverse this large nation of ours as we move from coast to coast during winter house sits (and year round during these Covid days...months...years ).

Once we're in place the car moves very little as long as we're in an urban area. In our current situation our car hasn't moved in over a month. I can walk to the food and booze store, and down to the parks.

I could easily see not needing a vehicle in an urban area. Not so in a rural area though.

[Lake-Effect]

Originally Posted by Dockhead

I have been living without a car (strange way to live for someone who grew up in the U.S.) for the last 5 years or so. Instead of own car, I get around by: (a) Uber (or taxi); (b) bicycle; (c) on foot; (d) trams and metro; (e) electric scooters rented by the minute; (f) car sharing; (g) rental cars. And (h) shopping online with delivery replacing 90% of going to shops.
...

I am just waiting for self-driving, public cars -- that will be a real revolution.

The things you mention are possible with urban density, but also very much enhanced by urban planning and design (and of course a public appetite for this different aproach is required).

I don't see self-driving cars being truly viable until their proponents realize that a 'smart' road system with embedded roadway sensors, vehicle tracking, cameras and 'smart' central coordination is as important as 'smart' vehicles. Which will limit the successful adoption of public self-driving cars to urban areas that are willing to design and prepare for them.

[Dockhead]

Originally Posted by Lake-Effect

. . . I don't see self-driving cars being truly viable until their proponents realize that a 'smart' road system with embedded roadway sensors, vehicle tracking, cameras and 'smart' central coordination is as important as 'smart' vehicles. Which will limit the successful adoption of public self-driving cars to urban areas that are willing to design and prepare for them.

You think that proponents of self-driving cars don't conceive the whole system? Of course they do. City planners have been working on private car-free cities for a few years by now. The advantages are irresistable -- private-car free and self-driving public car served cities are so fantastic that I think the whole world will flip over very quickly once the last bits of technology are perfected.

But the elements of the system you mention are trivial -- not at all the main points. Central coordination (or to a greater extent, peer-to-peer) is inherent to the whole idea. Vehicle tracking is trivial -- nothing Uber hasn't been doing already for 10 years by now. Roadway sensors are not a big deal.

The really challenging part of the system is city planning and roadways, not any of these minor technological details. Self-driving cars can co-exist with private cars, but the most profound benefits of self-driving cars are lost if you don't get rid of private cars and restructure the road system completely. Self-driving cars eliminate the need for parking, freeing up vast areas for other uses, and they increase effective throughput of the road system by an order of magnitude or more, greatly reducing the amount of road area needed, freeing up vast areas for bicycles, pedestrians, green spaces.

Journey times are slashed; traffic jams entirely eliminated. It's cheaper. So people become much more mobile; the city is transformed. Whereever you want to go, key it into your smartphone, and you are whisked directly there, silently, in a twinkle. No noise or exhaust from cars; green space everywhere. You can walk anywhere without dodging cars or walking between parked cars; bicycle anywhere. It will be the biggest thing to happen to cities since streetcars.

This revolution is already underway in a city planning office near you. My work is already practically affected by it; buildings I am developing are required to take account of the future city plan.


And yes, this system is suitable for urbanized areas, not rural or suburban areas. Rural and suburban areas can use self-driving cars, public or private. I guess all cars will be self-driving pretty soon. I've been renting BMW's drive "Drive Assist" functions which are pretty close to self driving -- they will steer you to keep you in your lane, speed up and slow down to follow traffic, park autonomously, all using radar and optical sensors. I reckon 10 years from now you will still be able to buy a private car, but not one which can't drive itself.


But rural areas have been emptying out for decades by now; suburbs are next. Suburbs were designed for private cars; once cities are rebuilt around public self-driving cars, who will want to live in a suburb any more?

[SailOar]

Originally Posted by Dockhead

...It does change the way you live -- no jumping in the car to spontaneously pick something up; dramatically narrows the geographic range of daily life. ...

Originally Posted by Dockhead

....
Journey times are slashed; traffic jams entirely eliminated. It's cheaper. So people become much more mobile; ...

Not sure how "dramatically narrows the geographic range of daily life" and "people become much more mobile" are self-consistant?

And why would "traffic jams [be] entirely eliminated"? If people still all need to get to work at the same time, and all leave work at the same time, seems that simply because a car is shared and self-driving won't change the volume of vehicles needed to move all those people -- unless they ride-share, which they could do now anyway?

[Dockhead]

Originally Posted by SailOar

Not sure how "dramatically narrows the geographic range of daily life" and "people become much more mobile" are self-consistant?

Those are two totally different things. Living in a present day city WITHOUT self driving cars, and without a car of your own, dramatically narrows the geographic range of daily life. In the city of the future, WITH self-driving cars, people become much more mobile.

Originally Posted by SailOar

And why would "traffic jams [be] entirely eliminated"? If people still all need to get to work at the same time, and all leave work at the same time, seems that simply because a car is shared and self-driving won't change the volume of vehicles needed to move all those people -- unless they ride-share, which they could do now anyway?

Self-driving cars increase the throughput of a road by 10x or more, for different reasons. One reason is that instead of driving with large gaps between cars, and individual, uncoordinated drivers braking and acclerating, and interfering with each other, self-driving cars form "trains" with little or no gap between them, and can go much faster more safely -- say 150km/h through a city with no gap between the cars, compare to 50km/h (so long as there is no traffic jam) with a couple of car lengths between them -- get it?


Traffic jams are eliminated not only because of higher throughput but also by coordination. Traffic jams are not allowed to form. If a roadway does start to get overloaded, additional cars are diverted to other routes before the speed starts to drop, and overloading is prevented.



Traffic jams are caused by a vicious cycle between falling throughput because speed is going down, which increases dwell time on the roadway, increasing density, further reducing speed and throughput, until it finally grinds to a halt. Cannot happen with self-driving cars. Speeds are kept up at all cost, which keeps throughput up under all conditions. In the very worst case, if there is nowhere to divert traffic to, you just have to wait a little before you're admitted to the roadway, then you blast to your destination at maintained high speed. But the very worst case is very unlikely considering the gigantic increase in carrying capacity of roads.

[Mike OReilly]

I've been predicting that we'll not only see the rise of self-driving vehicles, but that it will become illegal for mere humans to drive within my lifetime (which should be another 30 years unless I'm unlucky).

AI-driven vehicles will be (are) far safer, and more efficient, than having humans behind the wheel. It also feels like this near-future will be a lot less fun ... but that's my biased view.

I do wonder about motorcycles. I can't see them becoming self-driving.